Bengaluru Boys

The other day as I sat down to watch the Royal Challengers of Bengaluru play the Rajasthan Royals in the Indian Premier League at Bengaluru I was struck at the emotional discord that Rahul Dravid seemed to be going through as he went out for the toss. Rahul received huge applause from a partisan Bengaluru crowd...they were cheering the enemy. Rahul Dravid skippers the RR from Jaipur.
The enormity of playing against your home team at a ground where you learnt your cricket must have sunk in, even as the crowd chanted his name. Rahul Dravid is talked about as the next big thing in cricket administration and one day is expected to be the chairman of the International Cricket Council, the premier role in cricket administration. The cap stone, to a wonderful career on and off the cricket field.
As Rahul Dravid, left the centre, post the toss, there was this other bloke, in the RCB dug out looking relaxed and cheerful. Another Bengaluru boy and legend, Anil Kumble now mentors the RCB. Anil played for the RCB a couple of years and retired immediately on hearing that he was not selected by the RCB. His reason for quitting was that he could not dream of playing against Bengaluru, should he be selected by another franchise, as in the case of Rahul Dravid. The ethos and principle is fantastic. One loves the game and just wants to play, the other wants to play within defined parameters and not against his own ex collegues. Both made their choices and right in their own way and both fantastic role models and individuals.
Importantly both great Bengaluru boys!
As Shakespeare said in A Midsummer Night’s Dream:
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.